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The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: What Retractions Tell Us About Scientific TransparencyTRANSCRIPT
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: What Retractions Tell Us About
Scientific Transparency
Beta Phi Mu, Omicron ChapterRutgers
October 15, 2014
Ivan OranskyCo-founder, Retraction Watch
http://retractionwatch.com@ivanoransky
Is This Science Today?
Most Retractions Due to Misconduct
PNAS online October 1, 2012
Publisher Error
Duplication
Plagiarism
Legal Reasons
Lack of IRB Approval
Authorship Issues
Fraud: Image Manipulation
Fraud: Faked Data
Not Reproducible
How Long Do Retractions Take?
How Long Do Retractions Take?
What Happens to Retracted Papers’ Citations?
-Assn of College & Research Libraries 2011
What Happens to Retracted Papers’ Citations?
Budd et al, 1999: • Retracted articles received more than 2,000 post-
retraction citations; less than 8% of citations acknowledged the retraction
• Preliminary study of the present data shows that continued citation remains a problem
• Of 391 citations analyzed, only 6% acknowledge the retraction
What Happens to Retracted Papers’ Citations?
What Happens to Retracted Papers’ Citations?
“…annual citations of an article drop by 65% following retraction, controlling for article age and calendar year. In the years prior to retraction, there is no such decline, implying that retractions are unanticipated by the scientific community.”
Do Journals Get the Word Out?
Do Journals Get the Word Out?
“Journals often fail to alert the naïve reader; 31.8% of retracted papers were not noted as retracted in any way.”
Do Journals Get the Word Out?
How the Naïve Reader is Alerted to Retractions
Where retraction noted Retracted papers, n (%)
Watermark on pdf 305 (41.1)
Journal website 248 (33.4)
Not noted anywhere 236 (31.8)
Note appended to pdf 128 (17.3)
pdf deleted from website 98 (13.2)
The Euphemisms
“unattributed overlap”
The Euphemisms
“unattributed overlap”an “approach”
The Euphemisms
“unattributed overlap”an “approach”“a duplicate of a paper that has already been
published”…by other authors
The Euphemisms
“unattributed overlap”an “approach”“a duplicate of a paper that has already been
published”…by other authors“significant originality issue”
The Euphemisms
“unattributed overlap”an “approach”“a duplicate of a paper that has already been
published”…by other authors“significant originality issue”“Some sentences…are directly taken from other
papers, which could be viewed as a form of plagiarism”
The Rise of Post-Publication Peer Review
The Rise of Post-Publication Peer Review
-Cell 2013; 153: 1228-1238
hESCs in Cell
“It does however have several examples of image reuse which might be of interest to PubPeer members and readers.”
hESCs in Cell
hESCs in Cell
hESCs in Cell
hESCs in Cell
A number of comments about these errors in articles and blogs have drawn connections to the speed of the peer review process for this paper. Given the broad interest, importance, anticipated scrutiny of the claims of the paper and the preeminence of the reviewers, we have no reason to doubt the thoroughness or rigor of the review process.
hESCs in Cell
The comparatively rapid turnaround for this paper can be attributed to the fact that the reviewers graciously agreed to prioritize attention to reviewing this paper in a timely way. It is a misrepresentation to equate slow peer review with thoroughness or rigor or to use timely peer review as a justification for sloppiness in manuscript preparation.
Journals Are Listening
Journals Are Listening
Journals Are Listening
Doing The Right Thing Pays
Contact Info
http://retractionwatch.com
@ivanoransky
Thanks to Nancy Lapid, Reuters Health